Russia's National Settlement Depository (NSD) and trading companies are doing their utmost to unblock the assets of non-sanctioned Russian investors in the international depositories Euroclear and Clearstream, Dmitry Birichevsky, the head of the Russian Foreign Ministry's economic cooperation department, told Sputnik
MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 27th March, 2023) Russia's National Settlement Depository (NSD) and trading companies are doing their utmost to unblock the assets of non-sanctioned Russian investors in the international depositories Euroclear and Clearstream, Dmitry Birichevsky, the head of the Russian Foreign Ministry's economic cooperation department, told Sputnik.
On March 2, financial regulators of Belgium (Euroclear) and Luxembourg (Clearstream) extended the deadline for the possible submission of documents to unlock the assets of non-sanctioned Russian investors until the end of July.
"As far as we know, the terms of consideration of documents for unblocking assets at Euroclear and Clearstream were extended until July 24, 2023, under the 10th European Union's sanctions package. The next step is to obtain a license from the Belgian and Luxembourgish finance ministries to unlock assets. It is obviously a long process. We believe that the NSD and Russian trading companies are doing their best to solve this issue," Birichevsky said.
The EU introduced sanctions against the NSD as part of the sixth sanctions package last June, which was later supported by Switzerland. This move led to a freeze of Russian clients' securities and funds in various currencies in NSD's accounts with Euroclear and Clearstream, as well as blocking of funds in euros and francs in NSD accounts with foreign correspondent banks.
At the end of last year, NSD received general licenses to unlock assets in Euroclear and Clearstream, which were due January 7, 2023. A number of major market participants independently submitted applications to European depositories before the deadline.
The West and its allies imposed economic sanctions on Russia shortly after Moscow launched its military operation in Ukraine on February 24 and proceeded to freeze Russian assets throughout Europe. The foreign exchange reserves of the Russian central bank worth hundreds of billions of dollars have been frozen as well, with Western officials calling for the introduction of measures to confiscate the assets and allocate them for the rebuilding of Ukraine.
Moscow has repeatedly said that attempts to confiscate frozen Russian assets are an expropriation of property and a violation of international law. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told Sputnik that Russia would do everything possible to return the seized assets.
